Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget Strongly Supports the Sanford-Lee and Lee-Jones Amendments

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget strongly supports the Sanford-Lee and Lee-Jones amendments to the National Defense Authorization Act to limit funding for the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) fund. The Sanford-Lee amendment would codify criteria limiting OCO spending to items directly related to ongoing military operations. The Lee-Jones amendment would reduce OCO funding to the level requested by the Pentagon.

CRFB president Maya MacGuineas said the following:

OCO is the classic example of Washington smoke and mirrors.

To use this fund meant for emergency war spending as a way to circumvent spending caps and increase funding for the regular needs of the Pentagon is a budgeting gimmick, pure and simple. No one who votes to continue the abuse of OCO should claim to be fiscally responsible.

With our national debt at historic levels and rising faster than ever before, no appropriation should be “off-book.”

We encourage lawmakers to work across party lines and fund the Pentagon through an open and transparent budgeting process, with any increase in defense spending honestly accounted for and offset.

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For more information contact Patrick Newton, Press Secretary, at newton@crfb.org.